Very Early Casio Calculator

Yes, really early.

 

Not that early. This is a Dixons AKA I have of Sharps second pocket calculator.
The six AA rechargables inside add to the size. Unfortunately this one no longer works,
but I have a similar more recent model with the new fangled 7 segment displays that does.



and two cool adverts for the first Sharp calculator





The second shows that the display wasn't 7 segment. Every number is clearer apart from the zero which is half height.

 

yeah, today that's funny - "world's smallest" and the price of $345!!

 

I may have posted these pictures before, but the interesting thing is there is only about ten years difference between these two calculators, both made by Sharp

It was only recently that I discovered where the ELSIMATE name came from; Extra Large Scale Integration, meaning that they got most of the logic down to four main ICs in the $345 one and two in the ones I have.

I guess that makes something like a Pentium processor Extra Extra Extra Extra Large Scale Integration

 

Somewhere amongst my stuff is a Casio musical calculator I got--miniature stand included--at a garage sale.

A family story related to the subject:

When pocket calculators were new, my uncle was accountant for a big company at the time. He spent his own money to get one, and always kept it on him. When one of the Head Honchos saw him with it, they asked questions... and my uncle gladly explained & demonstrated the device. When done, at that very moment, the boss put out an order of ones for each member of the accounting department my uncle worked in... with a mandate that all said personnel become familiar with & make use of their issued unit, and carry it with them at all times while working.

 

Great story!!

 

In the 1970s calculators created as much excitement as mobile phones did in the noughties.
All the major technology companies were working on them. Sharp were partnered with Rockwell (better known as the builders of the Space Shuttle) for their ELSI Integrated Circuit technology. Intel designed the first Microprocessor (the 4004) for use in a Japanese Busicom calculator. Luckily for them they negotiated the right to sell the IC to other companies.

There was a UK comedy in which the Mother kept saying that she wanted her unambitious son to be "A young executive with a pocket calculator".
While unsuccessfully trying to find out which one I found a good article giving some history of when the calculator really was an executive status symbol.

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/05/arts/design/farewell-pocket-calculator.html

I do still use one at work most days as do other people. It is more convenient than messing around with the one in Windows.

To add a second family story about calculators, my Father was an Engineer at Rolls Royce Aero Engines. The first electronic calculator I ever saw was a Commodore Scientific he bought when the company arranged a staff discount so employees could get them at a reduced price. I remember being impressed that the numbers appeared on the screen as you keyed them in. Having only seen pictures before I didn't realise that would happen and had assumed you just keyed in a sum like you would key a number into a push button phone and then the answer would appear.

Sometime prior to that he once brought home a motor driven mechanical calculator to do some work at home. That was similar to 1960s cash registers with much whirring from inside as it calculated the answer, and was not much smaller or lighter than a cash register. At the time Rolls Royce had bought some Texas Instruments electronic scientific ones so didn't mind lending out the old mechanical ones. However, because of the price and pocketability of the pocket calculators they weren't allowed out of the office, and each one was screwed onto a large piece of wood making it too big to fit in a pocket or even a briefcase !

Despite doing consultancy work until the mid 1990s he never used a computer. Companies gave him work because in a couple of days, using paper and a calculator he could produce results accurate enough to show if a design was OK, while, at that time, the computer guys would require a couple of months to produce a computer model of the same design.

I would like to find a Sharp EL5103 which was one of the first formula entry calculators and his favourite.

 

One in Italy but way too expensive IMO.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Sharp-EL-5...949892?hash=item3d8c7c1fc4:g:lcgAAOSwTRFc-faV

 

That is the one, although I wouldn't pay that. I think they were about £30 new. They were common enough to feature in one of those catalogues that came in the Sunday paper. My Father liked the way he could quickly scroll back and make a change to a calculation, and actually bought a second one as a spare. When I am doing something similar I use Excel. I don't know what happened to most of his calculators but he didn't look after them. I remember the Casio that preceded those being bent and held together with sellotape after a couple of years. When he was doing consultancy work they would have all been tax deductable.

I have no idea how many calculators I have (maybe fifty ?) but am still in the mindset that they were once worth a weeks wages. Here is my second calculator, a Casio bought in 1978 which did cost me over a weeks wages, hence looking after it ever since.



If Mr X starts a new thread I could certainly add some more photos.

 

I can imagine, I was bought my first programmable one in 1985 (we called
them "engineering calculators") -
it was a requirement for the last 2 grades of the secondary school.
Don't remember the exact model but something like that:

 

Don't know where's mine, really.
After graduating from school I went for a high medical school and didn't need this machine there.

 

In the past I have seen a better webpage comparing the Sharp EL-805 with the Elektronika B3-04.
I suspect that any similarity is purely coincidental. Interestingly they are actually different internally.
http://copy-cats.work/electronics2/sharp-el-805-japan-electronica-b3-04-ussr

 

I found another interesting site of the subject
https://www.xnumber.com/xnumber/redcalcs.htm

Although we did get some Soviet made electronics over here like Vega mini TVs and Selena Radios, none of it both any resemblance to Western products.
Although the Soviet cars we got looked like old Fiats they were actually made under licence from Fiat so that wasn't an issue.

 

Yes, very.

 

BTW, Vertu of the late 70s.
Wondering how much this Sharp EL-8061 cost back then.